Traditional approaches to ecosystem restoration have considered afforestation to be an important tool. To alleviate land degradation in China, the Chinese government has therefore invested huge amounts of money in planting trees. However, the results of more than half a century of large-scale afforestation in arid and semi-arid China have shown that when the trees are not adapted to the local environment, the policy does not improve the environment, and may instead increase environmental degradation. When precipitation is lower than potential evaporation, surface soil moisture typically cannot sustain forest vegetation, and shrubs or steppe species replace the forest to form a sustainable natural ecosystem that exists in a stable equilibrium with the available water supply. The climate of much of northwestern China appears to be unsuitable for afforestation owing to the extremely low rainfall. Although some small-scale or short-term afforestation efforts have succeeded in this region, many of the resulting forests have died or degraded over longer periods, so policymakers must understand that these small-scale or short-term results do not support an inflexible policy of large-scale afforestation throughout arid and semi-arid northwestern China. Rather than focusing solely on afforestation, it would be more effective to attempt to recreate natural ecosystems that are better adapted to local environments and that thus provide a better chance of sustainable, long-term rehabilitation. LINK TO PAPER

I’ve been fascinated for a long time with Bible Prophecy and until recently I was a bit mystified about “Babylon the Great” (Revelation 18). However, it’s dawned on me recently that “Babylon the Great” is probably one and the same with what George Bush Sr. called “The New World Order” and it appears to me that two key components of this “Babylon/NWO” system are

(1) Big Cities, which in turn are dependent on …
(2) Big Agriculture and it’s attendant land control schemes and distribution networks.

One of the key characteristics I see in Big Ag is … FORCING the ground. Or to be blunt, RAPING the ground. God tells us we should “serve the ground” (Gen. 2:5 … “till” is a mistranslation – talk to Dan Grubbs). Josephus writes that “God was more delighted with the latter oblation, [Abel's] when he was honored with what grew naturally of its own accord, than he was with what was the invention of a covetous man, [Cain] and gotten by FORCING the ground; [emphasis mine]” (Ant. Bk.1, Ch. 2). One of the key characteristics of big cities seems to me to be PRIDE. (See Nebuchadnezzar’s boast about “great Babylon” in Daniel 4:30, “Glory of Rome” etc). So we have FORCING + PRIDE as the key characteristics of the “Babylon/NWO” system. So we could say that God wants us to do the opposite of this and follow the “Abel Way” (humbly working WITH Nature) as opposed to the “Cain Way” (proudly beating Nature into submission … which doesn’t work, by the way, all you get is death, destruction and slavery). I get the impression that in general God doesn’t like Big Cities (or at least the Pride that often goes along with them), as evidenced by the Tower of Babel Dispersion where God scattered them over the face of the earth.

So finally at 52 years of age, I have come to view the world in these terms:

Christian Stewardculture / Serving the Earth / Nurturing Her so that She Flourishes / Small Productive Communities Dependent only on God and their own Resourcefulness / Humility

NOTE1 … The Babylon / NWO system got it’s start with Cain, then the Tower of Babel, then Nimrod and Babylon and the kingdoms which succeeded Babylon – Persia, Greece and Rome, as depicted in Nebuchadnezzar’s Vision of the Great Image. Now it appears to me we are living in the Age of the Feet of Mixed Iron and Clay. Soon – I hope – the Stone cut out of the mountain without hands will smash the Feet of Iron and Clay and the God of Heaven will set up a Kingdom which shall never be destroyed. And the angel of Revelation 18 will shout “Babylon the Great is fallen, is fallen …”

NOTE2 … James Lovelock’s “Gaia” Hypothesis is interesting to me and – I believe – a very good description of how the earth really works. I find it fascinating that he chose a woman (Greek goddess named “Gaia”) to represent his theory. In light of this post, the Earth truly can be thought of as a woman … which can be RAPED … or LOVED. Men, not only should we ask ourselves “How do we treat the Earth that God gave us to steward?” but also “How do we treat our women that God gave us as help meets?” Do we RAPE and FORCE them? (Even within our marriages?) Or do we LOVE and NOURISH and CHERISH them?